I Need to Find a Dark Room

In that dark room, there should be either a brick wall or a pail of water, it doesn't matter which. I shall then proceed to either smash my head or dunk it until the lights go dim and this poisonous world recedes into the cool, blessed darkness.

First of all, I'd like to point out one tiny detail: THAT'S THE ENTIRE POINT OF FREE SPEECH. If you thought the title of the article was perhaps unnecessarily hyperbolic, well, you'd be wrong. The entire thing is a dog's breakfast of unsupported tropes, lefty shibboleths and insane leaps of "logic".

The author of this garbage is the Douglas Family Chair in American culture, history, and literary and interdisciplinary studies at Skidmore College. IOW, a credentialed idiot. She atarts:

Here’s the dilemma college presidents face in the fall: Either uphold free speech on campus and risk violent counterprotests, or ban conservative provocateurs and confirm the “freedom of speech” crisis on campuses. Either way their institution’s legitimacy is undermined.

Or they could, you know, support BOTH side's right to demonstrate, chant, march, pamphleteer etc..and crack heads if either one gets violent.

I can't quote the whole thing, and selected excerpts won't do it justice, but I'll try.

But that doesn’t diminish the extent to which the alt-right and conservatives are using “free speech” to attack and destroy colleges and universities, which have long promoted different variations of the internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties.

Actually, this sentence is pretty accurate. The problem is that " the internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties" is poison. It's wrong. It's EVIL. So yeah, maybe using free speech to attack and destroy it is a pretty good idea. It's the entire reason the 1st Amendment was created in the first place.

She spends a good deal of time talking about the 1950s and resistance to the Communist Party of the US, and even seems to admit that CPUSA needed to be opposed:

So anticommunist liberals made a series of arguments that justified denying communists these rights on account of their disingenuous intentions and totalitarian ideology. Most famously, liberal activist Arthur Schlesinger Jr. argued that communists hid behind the First Amendment to attack liberal democracy, using it as a shield as they sought to destroy the democratic system that upheld those rights.

But then she follows it up with this doozy of a paragraph.

Schlesinger understood there weren’t enough communists in the United States to actually foment revolution. But there were enough to divide progressive forces and thus create an opportunity for conservative Republicans to take power and repeal the New Deal, which he believed would in turn destabilize American capitalism and possibly tilt the balance of international power to the Soviets. Liberals would be chumps to let a principled commitment to “freedom of speech” undercut the pragmatic goal of political survival, which was the only way to ensure progress in civil rights and social welfare.

"We had to destroy the village in order to save it" logic at it's finest. So CPUSA needed to be opposed because it was interfering with the sacred leftist agenda, never mind that it was interfering by advocating for taking it to it's logical conclusion, which was anathema to most Americans and might make them resist the sacred cows of the left.

There's more, but it's all just unhinged lunacy. Read the whole thing, but I warn you, your brain will be reeling afterwards.

Democracy Dies in Delusion.

(P.S. I just saw an open thread go up, I put it back in draft because OM didn't know I was writing this one.)

One of the things that makes us Americans and not Europeans has been our commitment to civil liberties, including the right to free speech.

But there's a pernicious movement afoot to read the 14th Amendment right to "liberty" to override things in the Bill of Rights such as the right to free speech. You see, you can't have "liberty" if someone offends you with their speech. This current phase of progressivism is being played out at a college or university near you.

The likes of Obama loves them the 14th Amendment. The rest of the Constitution, not so much.

Posted by: Ignoramus at August 22, 2017 03:50 PM (+7/1f)

23
There is an alternative. They can uphold free speech on campus, and shut down the violent protests from the left (which are not free speech) by using appropriate force.

26
"But that doesn't diminish the extent to which the alt-right and
conservatives are using "free speech" to attack and destroy colleges and
universities, which have long promoted different variations of the
internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that
marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties."

34
What I've learned is that political violence works, and is a Good Thing. So, too, are efforts to suppress opinions differing from my own, and doxxing is altogether jake-aloo.
Are these people really sure they want to play under these new rules? I suspect they haven't thought this thing through.

38
"alt-right and conservatives are using "free speech" to attack and destroy colleges and universities"

How are they doing that?

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 22, 2017 03:53 PM (iVOAv)

39There's either free speech or there isn't. Total binary, like a light switch. On or off. There's no 'continuum' of allowable speech. Outside of yelling 'Fire!' in a crowded movie theater.

There's no John Kerry level 'nuance' involved. If the leftists don't understand this they deserve every ounce of pain they are about to endure. Or should endure. I'm not so sure it's not already too late.

40
"The author of this garbage is the Douglas Family Chair in American culture, history, and literary and interdisciplinary studies at Skidmore College."

Went to school in the area and we referred to them as Skidmark girls.

Posted by: Benji Carver at August 22, 2017 03:53 PM (OD2ni)

41
"The author of this garbage is the Douglas Family Chair in American culture, history, and literary and interdisciplinary studies at Skidmore
College."

Here's how Skidmore College grandly self-describes itself:

"In keeping with the college's founding principle of linking theoretical with applied learning, the Skidmore curriculum balances a commitment to
the liberal arts and sciences with preparation for professions, careers,
and community leadership. Education in the classroom, laboratory, and
studio is enhanced by co-curricular and field experience opportunities
of broad scope."

And here's the grade for scholastic rigor awarded to Skidmore by the whatwilltheylearn Web site: a big fat "D".

A Skidmore alumnus may well have taken no classes at all in the following areas: literature, economics, U.S. history or government, mathematics, and foreign language. None of those are required to graduate.

45
See, this is what gets me sliding from "just defending myself and my loved ones, otherwise goodwill to all" to "since you f***ing f***ers won't stop trying I have to conquer everything and everyone to defend myself and my loved ones".

Caesar started out destroying pirates.

I'll see your f***ing safe spaces and raise you "Making The World Safe For Sanity".

55
Small consolation but the first several comments I saw for the article were sharply critical.

Posted by: Insomniac at August 22, 2017 03:55 PM (0mRoj)

56
When you "destroy" something using Free Speech, it means that your argument was more convincing. That these brain damaged suckers of cock have an issue with that simply means that they know their position is untenable.

Posted by: The Douglas Family Ottoman at August 22, 2017 03:56 PM (Mouru)

58
In an alternate reality, I am not really robbing the bank. Instead, I am making a withdrawal. Not really a withdrawal, more like a loan which I will never repay because it isn't a loan. It's more like a grant, because I need the money, and the bank has too much.

If there was some way to spread the wealth around so everyone gets their fair share, we wouldn't have to wave these guns around, and forcibly remove money from the till. Because this money is owed to me. I've worked hard for nothing, and now I want to be paid.

62
Schlesinger understood there weren't enough communists in the United States to actually foment revolution.***And yet in 2008 the new left, which was created by the Soviets, managed to get one of their own elected to the presidency, and currently control the leadership of both political parties.

65
I once wished the WaPoo would just go away, but we need it. We need it to remind us that these people, these sentiments actually exist in what is regarded as coming from a moral authority that is above reproach.

This isn't some freshman college kid saying things like this. It's someone who feels comfortable enough in their own "freedom of speech" to espouse limiting ours.

Posted by: IP at August 22, 2017 03:57 PM (yaZEj)

66
"Ah, good old Skidmore where the rich girls try to dress down when out on the town. Bib overalls with pearl necklaces and diamond earings. But it is no longer an all girls school.
Posted by: Vic We Have No Party"

They always stood out like a sore thumb at The Parting Glass.

Posted by: Benji Carver at August 22, 2017 03:57 PM (OD2ni)

67
this absolutely infuriating headline I saw on yahoo news makes clear:"As neo-Nazis grow bolder, the 'antifa' has emerged to fight them"(only if you ignore the prior 18 months when antifa was vandalizing the venues of conservative speakers -- or are you equating conservatives with neo-Nazis?)
============
Look -- its in the script, they have a script and they are going to run through it.

502 AFTER gays spent a decade in a frenzy of bareback, creating an ecosystem where a previously rare virus (HIV) spread like wildfire, Reagan caused the AIDS epidemic by failing to mention it in a speech where liberals wanted him to mention it. Two weeks later, he finally mentioned AIDS, but the narrative was set forever: Reagan caused AIDS.

AFTER Antifa spent years smashing shit up and wreaking violence on conservatives, and AFTER the Democratic Party spent decades intentionally riling up racial resentment and rage, Trump says "both sides" in a tweet, then two days later blamed right-wingers, but BOOM, the narrative was already set forever: Trump caused violence

Posted by: zombie at August 22, 2017 03:29 PM (DQ4Fv)

Here is the new narrative as this absolutely infuriating headline I saw on yahoo news makes clear:

"As neo-Nazis grow bolder, the 'antifa' has emerged to fight them"

(only if you ignore the prior 18 months when antifa was vandalizing the venues of conservative speakers -- or are you equating conservatives with neo-Nazis?)

69
Hubvy has a dark room.. Fully fitted out for silver/platinum/palladium printing. Unfortunately, his photography genius has gone the way of the dodo. Mostly digital now bit his darkroom setup is a thing of beauty.

Posted by: Russkilitlover at August 22, 2017 03:57 PM (99Nt9)

70
If a lib can't win an argument they either change the subject or they tell their opponent to shut up.

Libs change the subject and say "shut up" a lot. Like all the time.

Posted by: Dang at August 22, 2017 03:58 PM (8b+oT)

71
I love how these pinheads always base their dopey premise on the baked in knowledge that anything right leaning is wrong.

Posted by: dananjcon at August 22, 2017 03:58 PM (WLK0w)

72Ha! I just saw a good comment from OregonMuse. Upon refresh it was gone!

81
I'm so old I remember when you caused violence on campus you got thrown out. That system seemed to work pretty well.

Why are people so afraid of liberal children?

Posted by: JackStraw at August 22, 2017 03:59 PM (/tuJf)

82"Ah, good old Skidmore where the rich girls try to dress down when out on the town. Bib overalls with pearl necklaces and diamond earings. But it is no longer an all girls school.
Posted by: Vic We Have No Party"

I am surprised the Dykes From Hell did not have a fit about that, a la Mills College ("womyn's" college in Oaktown, search-engine-other-than-Google it)

"In an last-ditch effort to prevent President Trump's election, the 'antifa' has traveled back in time to shut down the 1999 WTO meeting in Seattle."

Posted by: Geronimo Stilton at August 22, 2017 04:00 PM (10LGw)

87
55
Small consolation but the first several comments I saw for the article were sharply critical.

Posted by: Insomniac at August 22, 2017 03:55 PM (0mRoj)

I've read quite a few of them...haven't found one that agrees with her...yet.

Posted by: Tami at August 22, 2017 04:00 PM (Enq6K)

88
So what the fascist bint is saying is that universities are tasked with the agenda of inculcating "progressive" thought into the mushy little heads of their students, and conservative ideas might expose the idiocy of those ideas. Therefore, the expression of conservative thought should be restricted. You can't have the snowflakes starting to think for themselves, you know.

I don't remember that place but we are talking about almost 50 years ago.

Posted by: Vic We Have No Party at August 22, 2017 04:01 PM (mpXpK)

90
But that doesn't diminish the extent to which the alt-right and
conservatives are using free speech to attack and destroy colleges and
universities***Most non-leftists believe the universities have become nothing more then sources of indoctrination.

If this is false, allowing people to make the claim on campus is the best way to show it.

The clearest way to prove it is to ban such individuals from the campus on the grounds that hearing alternative views is too dangerous.

Posted by: 18-1 at August 22, 2017 04:01 PM (eSx+E)

91
(only if you ignore the prior 18 months when antifa was vandalizing the venues of conservative speakers -- or are you equating conservatives with neo-Nazis?)
Posted by: OregonMuse, AoSHQ Thought Leader at August 22, 2017 03:57 PM (6kP6G)
------------

Oh, you know, six of one, half dozen of another.

Posted by: bluebell at August 22, 2017 04:01 PM (UoSKV)

92
Sometimes you can only stand and marvel. It's like those 180 car pile-ups you sometimes see on the news. You wonder how someone can pile up that much stupidity on one pile.
According to this Tofu-for brains, the whole Free Speech crisis is a nefarious plot of the alt-right!

I would start work on an anti-lunacy surface to surface missile only I know that no possible targeting system would be able to decide what to hit, there are simply too many targets!

One of the things that makes us Americans and not Europeans has been
our commitment to civil liberties, including the right to free speech.

But there's a pernicious movement afoot to read the 14th Amendment
right to "liberty" to override things in the Bill of Rights such as the
right to free speech. You see, you can't have "liberty" if someone
offends you with their speech. This current phase of progressivism is
being played out at a college or university near you.

The likes of Obama loves them the 14th Amendment. The rest of the Constitution, not so much....That will backfire on the liberals, trust me history is our guide on that.

Liberals have tried to do the same thing with Gun Control since the early 1960s and it has backfired big time on them at the polls and more States than ever have some form of Constitutionally Carry than ever before.

Posted by: The Great White Scotsman at August 22, 2017 04:01 PM (0pcwX)

94
Why the fuck do they want to turn this place into a commie town shithole?
=================
Because they are miserable. When everyone else is miserable they won't have to look at anyone who is happy.

Posted by: simplemind at August 22, 2017 04:01 PM (D7NV+)

95Here's the dilemma college presidents face in the fall: Either uphold free speech on campus and risk violent counterprotests, or ban conservative provocateurs and confirm the "freedom of speech" crisis on campuses. Either way their institution's legitimacy is undermined.

Damn, and I thought I had the Big Lie technique perfected. These guys have taken it to whole new levels.

Posted by: Joseph Goebbels at August 22, 2017 04:02 PM (0mRoj)

100
84 They keep trying and Leftists will tell you they will get it right yet only if you give them another chance.

Posted by: Skip at August 22, 2017 04:02 PM (pPKG5)

101
Schlesinger understood there weren't enough communists in the United States to actually foment revolution. But there were enough to divide progressive forces and thus create an opportunity for conservative Republicans to take power and repeal the New Deal, which he believed would in turn destabilize American capitalism and possibly tilt the balance of international power to the Soviets. Liberals would be chumps to let a principled commitment to "freedom of speech" undercut the pragmatic goal of political survival, which was the only way to ensure progress in civil rights and social welfare.

-
You put the lime in the coconut, mix 'em both together.
Put the lime in the coconut den you feel better

102
The left has placed their greatest and best hope in a gang of unemployed malcontents living in their mom's basement.

Posted by: Dang at August 22, 2017 04:02 PM (8b+oT)

103"In an last-ditch effort to prevent President Trump's election, the 'antifa' has traveled back in time to shut down the 1999 WTO meeting in Seattle."
Posted by: Geronimo Stilton at August 22, 2017 04:00 PM (10LGw)

Which is REALLY odd, given Trump's penchant for economic nationalism and skepticism to globalism. Trump was too young back then and up to his neck in real estate deals, but were such a conference going on today and not then, Trump would be opposition stumping outside it.

107
Why the fuck do they want to turn this place into a commie town shithole?

-----

Mans inner urge to lord over other humans.

Simple.As.That.

Posted by: fixerupper at August 22, 2017 04:03 PM (8XRCm)

108
81 Why are people so afraid of liberal children?
Posted by: JackStraw at August 22, 2017 03:59 PM (/tuJf)

Greed.

Getting on the wrong side of the Trustafarians means no more of their parents money finding its way into your coffers.

Posted by: Hikaru at August 22, 2017 04:03 PM (CMbMd)

109
I recall reading sometime in the mid to late 1960s - and I'm probably paraphrasing a bit - that Gus Hall, long time chairman of the US Commies (CPUSA) was carrying on about the 1st Amendment and all that, and someone at this appearance said "so you believe in free speech for the Birch Society?" And Hall promptly replied, "no, they don't deserve free speech because they are trying to take it away from others."

same old same old. demand something, get it, then try to make sure no one who disagrees with you has the same right. Left was probably sure that Pres Hillary would go even further that Obama in giving them everything they wanted, then Trump came along and threw gravel in the gears. If the Sup Ct won't give you what you want, maybe mob action will.

Posted by: mallfly suPreme at August 22, 2017 04:03 PM (ILitO)

110
I had a similar convo at work about the intolerance millennials have for free speech nowadays, esp on college campuses. The hypothesis is it comes from kids growing up taught to be nice and kind and never hurt other people's feelings. So when they are released from their cocoon to the real world the reality of being surrounded by people who never care about others' feelings, and being nice and kind, damages their worldview psyche and they are now overreacting.

And this was from LIBERAL baby boomer coworkers, mind you, saying this. Maybe there is an awakening to the ridiculousness after all. Maybe people are getting Woke, as the left likes to say.

If it's WaPo, it's Crap-o. And dishonest at that. Pretty much by definition.

Posted by: AnonymousDrivel at August 22, 2017 04:04 PM (H8S+R)

120
She's a communist pretending to be an anti-communist so that she can use the communist tactics that she describes
==========
Hmmm

A concern troll, pretending to be "un-concerned" so that he can use the concern troll tactics . . .
Is this a thing?

naw couldn't be . . .

Posted by: simplemind at August 22, 2017 04:04 PM (xdvLt)

121
So CPUSA needed to be opposed because it was interfering with the sacred leftist agenda, never mind that it was interfering by advocating for taking it to it's logical conclusion, which was anathema to most Americans and might make them resist the sacred cows of the left.

129
Translation: if you're really a conservative and a capitalist, you should support banning conservative speech on campus, because I support banning communist speech on campus because it might harm capitalism (ie. socialism).

Posted by: Steve and Cold Bear at August 22, 2017 04:07 PM (/qEW2)

130
123. Go and read aloud from one of Reagan's speeches in a public place. Then you'll get the cosplay gear.

131
Charles Murray ran an experiment when he sent a draught of his new book on elite stratification to various colleges, to rank between far left and far right

most marked it solidly middle, or maybe lightly left.

of course, Sargon of Akkad is lightly left too, and he's a garbage human now apparently.

Posted by: Boulder terlit hobo at August 22, 2017 04:07 PM (evq2A)

132
"But that doesn't diminish the extent to which the alt-right and conservatives are using "free speech" to attack and destroy colleges and universities, which have long promoted different variations of the internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties."
-----------------------------------
-The dogmas of the ruling class must be protected from any argument!!!!

-Why is "free speech" in quotation marks but "liberalism" is not? If free speech for all is not one of your values, in what sense are you a "liberal?"

-In what sense does shutting yourself off from everyone who disagrees with you, from Aristotle to Burke, from Cicero to Jefferson, make you "educated?"

Posted by: Margarita DeVille at August 22, 2017 04:07 PM (0jtPF)

133
120 She's a communist pretending to be an anti-communist so that she can use the communist tactics that she describes
==========
Hmmm

A concern troll, pretending to be "un-concerned" so that he can use the concern troll tactics . . .
Is this a thing?

150
The monument protection protest was maybe orchestrated by the Occupy/Obama guy just to cause chaos, or maybe to tie KKK to Trump. In any case they deserved to be there ... per court order AND per First amendment. That some came dressed for battle expecting an antifa assault looked pretty goofy, with their weird shields, and it was bad optics.

BUT they had they (court ordered) right to protest. Antifa showed up only to shut them up and beat them down. So there was only one anti-US group there, even though the KKK/quasiNazi group was distasteful to the extreme.

Trump could have framed it that way ... but chose to say both groups bad, MFM and their cohorts said ONLY KKK bad, antifa (alt-left) is GOOD.

Maybe Trump was in-artful, maybe he was Machiavellian ... but he made the MFM and Democrats stand up for commie flag carrying (even if not that day) rioters that actually despise America.

Sides are drawn ... Trump was against both.MFM/Dems are pro-communist rioters.

So they are throwing all the shit at the wall, hoping something, ANYTHING will stick:

-Antifa-BLM-violence-Russia, Russia, Russia-Trump is a Nazi-Trump is insane-Trump has dementia-Trump impeach NOW-eliminate conservatives on TV-eliminate conservatives online-tell conservatives not to shop at your business

I'm sure there's more, those are just the things I could think of off the top of my head.

Posted by: shibumi at August 22, 2017 04:12 PM (aT+Bx)

156
re 146: says to one of her kids, "It's ok, I'll just sit here and try to sew in the dark till I go blind."

And I can promise you one thing - expelling violent, intolerant students will help your campus. Make it a happy, healthier place. Because the same intolerant lunatics that scream and break shit when they hear a speaker say something they don't like, has your faculty cowering behind their desks right now. They are the people making your life utterly not worth living. They are ruining college for everyone.

And, trust me on this, it will help the expelled students. they will realize that crying and violence and threats have no place in civilized society.

McCarthy was a piker. The number of communists infesting this country was beyond his wildest dreams.
I also blame Bill Buckley because of his war against the Birchers. A lot of those arguments read the same as NeverTrumper garbage does today.

Posted by: sock_rat_eez, they are gaslighting us 24/7 at August 22, 2017 04:15 PM (Umfx1)

171The Parting Glass Irish Pub Restaurant was
established in 1981 and it's one of the oldest continuously run pub/
restaurants in Saratoga Springs. USA Today voted the pub as one of the
top ten Irish pubs in the United States

OK it was not there when I was there. I had been gone 10 years when it opened.

Posted by: Vic We Have No Party at August 22, 2017 04:16 PM (mpXpK)

172
160 a child was playing with a Fundamental Right the size of a tangerine ..
Posted by: Grump928(C) at August 22, 2017 04:13 PM (QQ+il)

176I also blame Bill Buckley because of his war against the Birchers. A lot of those arguments read the same as NeverTrumper garbage does today.Posted by: sock_rat_eez, they are gaslighting us 24/7 at August 22, 2017 04:15 PM (Umfx1)

To be fair, the Birchers were saying goofy crap like "Dwight Eisenhower is a self-conscious communist agent". Buckley simply lost patience with them.

177
"I also blame Bill Buckley because of his war against the Birchers."

A lot of Red Sox fans have never forgiven him for the 1986 WS.

Posted by: Benji Carver at August 22, 2017 04:18 PM (OD2ni)

178
I've decided in left speak "multicultural" means that you can be any shade of color, or come from any country as long as you think America stinks, are secular and espouse completely leftist values-We all think exactly alike and are different colors-Yay-Multiculturalism!

Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 22, 2017 04:18 PM (iVOAv)

179
It appears the West did not win the cold war. Yes, we destroyed the Soviets...but they destroyed our political system as well..just a little later.

If you took the average Democrat in 1987 and showed them what the Democrats stand for now, they wouldn't believe you and would likely claim no one could be so insane.

181
Medieval universities had more freedom of thought than current ones. They LIVED by debate --- hair-splitting logical debate. NO question was forbidden --- and they loved a really good "Devil's Advocate" who could argue the unorthodox viewpoint.

188
re 178: we must accept and appreciate all cultures, until you decide you like something (like tacos) and then you're guilty of cultural appropriation.

Posted by: mallfly suPreme at August 22, 2017 04:20 PM (ILitO)

189178 I've decided in left speak "multicultural" means that you can be any shade of color, or come from any country as long as you think America stinks, are secular and espouse completely leftist values-We all think exactly alike and are different colors-Yay-Multiculturalism!
Posted by: FenelonSpoke at August 22, 2017 04:18 PM (iVOAv)

193
Nice to have the other side explain its dishonesty and complete lack of morality. "The only reason we opposed communists is because republicans would gain the majority fighting them alone." The left's lack of self awareness never ceases to amaze.

198
Nice to have the other side explain its dishonesty and complete lack of morality. "The only reason we opposed communists is because republicans would gain the majority fighting them alone." The left's lack of self awareness never ceases to amaze.
=======

The whole damn piece is a huge mask dropped.

The executive summary would read something like this:

"Yes, we are better than you fuckers out there."

Posted by: bicentennialguy at August 22, 2017 04:23 PM (vg8iE)

199Then... then... he made a barrel worthy un-closed tag comment and went back and surreptitiously closed the tags.

213
171 The Parting Glass Irish Pub Restaurant was
established in 1981 and it's one of the oldest continuously run pub/
restaurants in Saratoga Springs. USA Today voted the pub as one of the
top ten Irish pubs in the United States

OK it was not there when I was there. I had been gone 10 years when it opened.
Posted by: Vic We Have No Party at August 22, 2017 04:16 PM (mpXpK)

Vic -
Meet you there? I grew up 20 miles away and never went there myself. I'll buy first couple of rounds. Least I can do for all the wonderful morning content you post.

Posted by: Our Country is Screwed at August 22, 2017 04:27 PM (jxbfJ)

214
Then... then... he made a barrel worthy un-closed tag comment and went back and surreptitiously closed the tags.

228Either uphold free speech on campus and risk violent counterprotests, or ban conservative provocateurs and confirm the "freedom of speech" crisis on campuses.

Let's say you're trapped in the basement of a psychopath, his prisoner. If you sit in the corner quietly, there will be no violence. If you try to leave or shout for help when you see a passerby, in a sense you will be the cause of that violence. But it would be dishonest to say that you are in the wrong because you provoked violence. I think this is analogous to the liberal dishonesty in blaming conservatives for violence in the college campus cases in articles like this.

Posted by: Steve and Cold Bear at August 22, 2017 04:31 PM (/qEW2)

229
>>> Its getting hard to live as an American these days. Every night I have to check under my bed for Russians, NAZIs, Klansmen and Lena Dunham. Can someone make the crazy stop?
Posted by: Puddin Head at August 22, 2017 04:11 PM (YV+SU)

I like the theory that, in a world of chaos where Trump is their president and murky villains like islamic terrorists live in our midst, the left in its current mental fragility is retreating back to tried and true concrete villains. Nazis are an easy, familiar, universal evil. It is more comforting to retreat to a known evil than to try and process new, unknown villains.

The problem is the left can no longer differentiate friend from foe and now sees Nazis everywhere. It's an interesting, if frightening, cultural rohrsarch test.

Posted by: LizLem at August 22, 2017 04:31 PM (hvf9s)

230226 The five things common to a repub potus according to the left..

234
218 Is there any planned protests in Arizona tonight?
___________________________________

Don't know, but we are playing the Arizona Diamondbacks tonight and we plan to spend 9 innings in Flushing, NY, shitting our pants and running around while we do it.

Which is kinda like Antifa.

Too bad we can't wear masks.

Posted by: The NY Mets at August 22, 2017 04:32 PM (4AVeu)

235
The town of Urbana, IL is struggling with some of its residents, who want to break away from the rest of the town. Urbana has a relatively mild crime rate, but most of it is concentrated on the western side of tow, so the folks on the east side have drawn up the papers to be sent to the State for their own incorporation.

However, the rest of Urbana is not too fond of the idea. For tax considerations, among other things. And they greatly outnumber in population the folks who are trying to incorporate the east side of town.

To be fair though, they are going to put it to a vote. It's likely the vote will pass, but at least it will be democratically decided:

Do the people believe in the East Urbana or not.

Posted by: BurtTC at August 22, 2017 04:32 PM (TOk1P)

236
These are not people you can have an open, honest, reasoned exchange of ideas with. I'll leave the logical conclusion of that to your deduction.

There, I nutshelled it for you. To her, any opinion that is not held by her is provocative. If you don't march in step, you are an agitator, a dissenter, and you provoke trouble.

She'll never stop to think about the argument. She'll only stop to apply judgement to the arguer, and use her own opinions as the litmus test. These people are pure narcissists.

Posted by: Orson at August 22, 2017 04:40 PM (FMtEr)

246
Above-the-fray presidential tone and content is fine - well, it was fine, in a different country - but Trump really should start talking plainly. In all our past, a president could mostly stay above-the-fray because he had many surrogates and allies, political and institutional, getting into the weeds, and if needed slapping down lies and dishonesty by critics.

News flash: Trump has none of this. Completely on his own - can't think of an historical analog. His own cabinet is nearly mute. It's sort of like the Dubya years, except the slander and disinformation has been turned up X 10 (which is saying something). Silence, and hope, are not a strategy - and "presidential" unity-mongering, a la last night's address, is completely inadequate. It's almost pathetic.

So tonight he should specifically engage with the lies and slanders that have failed to convince most of the country, but nonetheless are the framework everyone works within. The ridiculous and despicable comments of the idiot PHX mayor provide the perfect launching point. If he wanted to the country (and himself) even more good, he good directly take on the insane slanderous nonsense from racist congressmen.

Silence in the face of mass slander and disinformation, oddly, is a strategy with a low % chance of success.

Tillerson and I are using our eclipse glasses to stare into a 100-watt bulb. The colors are really cool. I'm playing Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" on my I-phone while we do it.

By the way, great job cribbing that Afghanistan war plan from the Bush library. I don't think the boss even noticed.

I think I'm going to crib the Kennedy plan on civil rights. He's so busy tweeting, the boss won't even notice.

Tee-hee!

By the way, how do you like that new communications director. Is she hawt or what?

Anyway, gotta go. Ballbuster Kelly is coming down the hall!

Posted by: Jeff Sessions at August 22, 2017 04:43 PM (4AVeu)

249
Margarita, "free speech" gets sneer quotes because it is a dog whistle.
Did you see the first iteration of the DC-area NBC4 article on the Boston protest?
The headline was "Thousands protest "free speech"', at first.
The commentary made much fun of the no-doubt unintended truth of the matter, and also asked why the quotes?
The article was reposted with a new headline.
They can't come right out and say "Nazi" if they know they are not (just as they had to correct for Nazis in the linked article, after calling Skokie KKK), because liability.
So nudge nudge wink wink "free speech" rules.

254
I refuse to read anything published by the WaPo. It is all propaganda. From your excerpts, I am in awe as to how Professor Jennifer Delton could achieve a Ph.D and professorship, yet remain a complete imbecile.

Posted by: Locke Common at August 22, 2017 06:28 PM (I2kp0)

255
This impossible dilemma is no accident. It has been part of a strategy, deployed first by conservatives and perfected by the alt-right.

'No-platforming', i.e., disrupting events with speakers the left disapproves of, has been a tactic of the left for a very, very long time. All Bannon and Milo have done is refuse to be intimidated into cancelling themselves, which forced university administrators to do it.

Because standing up to the antifa requires a spine, and university administrators have none.